Karl Rove: Crossroads GPS follows the rules

Republican strategist Karl Rove insisted on Sunday the tax-exempt ,nonprofit group he helped create operates within the law.

Appearing on ABC’s “This Week,” Rove was responding to a barb from co-panelist Arianna Huffington, who said: “If you look at Crossroads GPS, it’s all about politics."

“Crossroads GPS – an organization I helped create but I don’t run it, I’m not on the board, I’m not an officer. But the leadership knew right from the get-go they were going to be looked at closely,” Rove said. “So the laws and rules that the IRS has promulgated for decades were followed very closely by GPS. For exactly that – they knew they’d get extra scrutiny.”

Crossroads GPS and many other groups on both sides of the political spectrum have increasingly chosen to organize as tax-exempt 501(c)4 groups. That status exempts them from taxes, but also allows them to keep their donors secret.

By definition, 501(c)4 groups are not supposed to participate extensively in politics. But in recent years, these groups have argued that as long as they spend less than 50 percent of their time or budget on campaign activities, they’re within the law.

Rove said the problem of political nonprofit groups was not just limited to the Democratic side.

“These groups – 501c4 groups have been active for years on the Democratic side, on the liberal side,” he said.

“And there’s been no criticism. There was no criticism from the left in 2000 when the NAACP voter fund spent $10 million to run an ad accusing George W. Bush of being a bigot. No concern on the left when Americans United for Change ran television ads targeting Republican Senators up for reelection in 2007 and 2008 over the Iraq surge,” he said.